I invite you to turn with me in your Bible tonight to 1 John chapter 4. 1 John chapter 4, we've been going through this tremendous little epistle back at Harvest, and it's my pleasure to bring the wonderful truth that John has for us, that the Holy Spirit has for us to your attention this evening. 1 John chapter 4. I'm going to begin reading at verse 7 of chapter 4 and read through the end of the chapter. I'm going to be looking specifically at verses 13 through 19. I'd like to very quickly give you an overview of what John is doing. His purpose in the book is to invite his readers to enter into fellowship with the Father and the Son. That's his heart's desire. That's his joy. He wants them to know, to have this wonderful assurance that they are the children of God. There are two great obstacles to that experience of deep assurance that you find in the letter. One obstacle is false profession, where people say, I believe in God, and yet they don't love their neighbor. Paul says, that man who says, I love God and I don't love my brother, he's a liar. Others say, I believe in God, I'm not sure that Jesus of Nazareth is truly God in flesh. And John says, that person who does not confess that Christ is the Son of God in flesh, that person is a liar. That person is not a true believer. And then there are those who struggle in their faith. Another great obstacle is simply the struggle of doubt and fear. And John, throughout this letter, as we see, is seeking to minister to that fear. And that's what he does here tonight. One of the great texts in this little book is in chapter 3, where John summarizes Christian obedience. And he says, verse 23, This is his commandment, that we believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and love one another as he's commanded us. And then in chapter 4, he talks about that belief in Jesus, and be wary of false teachers. Test the spirits, lest your faith be destroyed by false teachers. And so he's dealt with believing in Jesus, and now he moves in the second part of chapter 4 here to love. And it's an amazing description here of the love of God and how that love frees us and assures us. So let's pick it up then, verse 7 of John chapter 4. Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent His only Son into the world so that we might live through Him. And this is love, not that we have loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God. If we love one another, God abides in us and His love is perfected in us. By this we know that we abide in Him and He in us because He has given us of His Spirit. And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent His Son to be the Savior of the world. Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. By this is love perfected with us so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment, because as he is, so also are we in this world. There is no fear in love, But perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love. We love because he first loved us. If anyone says, I love God and hates his brother, he is a liar. For he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from him, whoever loves God must also love his brother. Let's bow together and ask the Lord. to bless us in the reading and the preaching of this word. Let's pray. Oh, Father in heaven, you are the God who in your great love for us has given us this word to point us to Jesus Christ. Oh, God, we need your Holy Spirit because we can hear the most glorious things and be dead to them. And so we pray that that beautiful spirit would come and do his precious illuminating work in our heart that we might see Jesus that we might know and believe the love that God has for us in him and Father I pray that you would be with me as I preach Father I pray that you would just keep my voice strong and Father keep my heart and mind focused on the glory of Jesus Christ and that through this earthen vessel you would display the beauty and the riches of this treasure treasure we have in the gospel of Jesus Christ. We pray in his name. Amen. The title for my message tonight is The Assurance of Love. The Assurance of Love. John, this delightful text is pursuing for you, the readers, the bold, confident assurance in the midst of life and that same bold confidence in the face of death. Just a few weeks ago, I was reading a short biography of a young couple, John and Betty Stamm. John and Betty Stamm were missionaries in China back in the 1930s. They were a delightful couple. I wish you could see their picture. She was a beautiful woman and he was just a noble looking young man. They were 27 years old. They had a little baby and they were excited about the work that God had called them to do there in a remote village in China. Then one day in December of 1934. Some bandits from the Red Army came into town. They quickly captured John and Betty. They hid the baby, John and Betty did, and so she was safe. But John and Betty were taken captive and led outside of the village. And the next morning they were both executed with a sword. When their bodies were found, the man who found their bodies where they lay testified that there was a look of great peace and even joy on the faces of this couple, martyrs who loved not their life even unto death. John wants us, he wants you, to have that same joy, that same peace, that same confidence as we live our short years that God gives to us in this world as we face the reality of death. John has written this letter. He's an old man by now. He's in his maybe early 90s or late 80s. He's an old man. He's writing to his precious children. John himself will soon die. And he wants them to know something. If you look at chapter 5, verse 13, he says, I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life. John does a similar thing in his gospel, if you remember. In John chapter 20 verse 31, John says, I write these things, many other things could be written, but these things I've written that you might know that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and that you might believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and have eternal life in his name. So he writes his gospel so that they will believe that Jesus is the Christ. And now he writes his letter so that they will know that their belief is true, it's not been in vain, that they will know that they have eternal life. It's a wonderful, wonderful letter. And we find this desire that they would know in verses 13. By this we know that we abide in Him. You see it again in verse 16. So we have come to know and believe the love that God has for us. And this knowledge is going to produce a confidence in the day of judgment. Confidence in the day of judgment. And we need this competence. We need this assurance. We are pilgrims, and life at times is very scary. Life sometimes is excruciatingly difficult, and we easily can doubt the goodness of God. We easily can doubt the reality of our faith. We know that we believe the facts of the gospel maybe, but there's often, isn't it true, we look like a good Christian. If we would ask someone to come in and sort of evaluate, do you think this person's a good Christian? I'm sure that person would say, they look like a fine Christian. They're here at a Sunday evening service, and they seem to be living a moral life. Their doctrine is sound. And praise God those things are true. But you know your heart. I know my heart. I know the sick pettiness that resides there. I know the perversions that lie there. And you know your own heart. And the devil is quick to remind us of these things, isn't he? Look at yourself. Is this what a real Christian looks like? Does a real Christian think these things? Does a real Christian do these things? Feel these things? We need this assurance. William Perkins, an old Puritan, says we cannot do the devil a greater pleasure than to neglect the getting of this assurance. He cares not so much what men may profess and what knowledge or other gifts of the spirit they may have, so long as they lack this blessed assurance. Think of how easily we are led into sin when we lack assurance. Think about how easily we give in to despair, to anxiety, to fear, how easily we turn to our idols, to our pet sins, because we lack assurance. Sinclair Ferguson noted in a recent sermon, most Christians live far below the confidence which God intends us to have in His love. Unfortunately, I think that's absolutely true. Confident, blessedly assured, joyful Christians can be rare, too rare. And John wants us to grow. Well, how are we going to grow? What is first the nature of this blessed assurance? We're going to look at the content of Christian assurance, first of all, and then we're going to look at the ground or the means by which we get this assurance. then the fruit of this assurance, and finally the foundation. So the content, the means, the fruit, and the foundation as we look at God's Word tonight. What is the nature of this assurance? What's its content? Well, verse 13 tells us, By this we know that we abide in Him and He in us. John has a wonderful way of talking about what it means to be a Christian. A Christian is not first and foremost someone who professes certain doctrines. It is essential that he profess certain doctrines. If you say you're a Christian and you do not believe that Jesus is the Christ and all that that entails, well, your profession is worthless. But a Christian is not first and foremost someone who can confess to and ascribe to correct theology. The devil can ascribe to correct theology. Nor is a Christian someone who lives by a certain moral standard. It's essential to live by a moral standard. And John will say, if you love the world, then you're at odds with God. You can't say that you live in the light and walk in the darkness and love the darkness. And yet a Christian is not someone simply who lives by a moral standard. There are many people who live by very high moral standards and yet know nothing of God or of his son Jesus. A Christian, in John's view, is wonderfully a person who abides in God. I hope that strikes you as an astonishing thing to say about someone. It seems a little arrogant that you abide in God and God abides in you. If we understand just the rudimentary truths about who we are, made of dust. Rebels by nature, prone to wander. And yet John says, a Christian is someone, by definition, who has had a change of address, a change of status. A Christian is someone who dwells in the secret place of the Most High and abides in the shadow of the Almighty. That's his home address. It's where he lives. He's left the far country and the pig pens there and he's come home to the Father's house. He's been embraced by the Father's loving arms. He's been adopted as the Father's children. Behold, what manner of love the Father has given to us that we should be called the children of God and that is what we are. It's what we are. Your baptism is your adoption certificate. that you have been claimed by the living God, by the God the Father himself. You are someone, Paul says it so wonderfully in Romans chapter 1, verse 6. You are someone who has been called to belong to Jesus. Can you think of a better title? Can you think of a more privileged status? Called by the glory and the goodness of God, called sovereignly to belong to Jesus. It's an astonishing thing. And these are the things, you see, that God wants us to know, to believe, to be assured of, to be confident in. But how do we gain that blessed assurance? Well, John gives us, and we'll go through these somewhat quickly, John gives us three ways that we gain this assurance. Note first in verse 13, the last part of that, the work of the Holy Spirit. By this we know that we abide in Him and He in us because He has given us of His Spirit. He says something almost identical at the end of chapter 3, verse 24. By this we know that He, that is God, abides in us by the Spirit whom He has given us. The Spirit has this ministry of speaking and working assurance into the hearts of God's children. And he does this, well, I think very specific ways. We're not talking here about, well, John Wesley talked about this. My heart was strangely warmed, he says, when he was converted. And I hope that is true. And yet I know people who do not think they're Christians because their heart has not been strangely warmed. They've not had some supernatural or extraordinary experience of the Spirit speaking to their spirit and bearing witness that they are truly a believer. and so they don't dare say they are a Christian because they've not had this extraordinary experience. Well, that's not what John means at all. If you look at Scripture, what is the evidence of the Holy Spirit's presence? How do you know if the Holy Spirit is actively engaged in your mind and in your heart? Well, one way we would know is John 16, verse 8, where Jesus says, I'm going to send you the Holy Spirit, and when He comes, He's going to convict the world in regard to sin and righteousness. judgment. It's not a ministry that we would maybe look forward to with eager anticipation. And yet Jesus says, it's good that I go. It's necessary that he come. It's better for you. And when he comes, this is how you'll know. He's going to convict. He's going to, when he enters a person's life, he's going to be, he's going to help that person realize the reality of their sin. Not just the fact that they've done things that are contrary to the will of God but that they are something contrary to the will of God. That they do things that displease God, that offends God. They do them because they love to do them. They delight in those things. They are a sinner. Not just someone who commits sin. And the Spirit will then convict in regards to righteousness that God is actually truly perfectly holy and righteous and in his righteousness he's obligated to judge he's obligated and does so can we say somewhat gladly although he takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked God we're also told he does not hesitate to judge he must judge the spirit convicts us of this So we could say when the Spirit comes, we would say with David, Psalm 51, verse 4, that you are proved right when you speak and justified when you judge. There's something even when the Spirit convicts you of sin that will say, Lord, better that I be condemned than that you set your righteousness aside. It is good that you are righteous. It's good that you hate sin. It's good even that there is such a thing as judgment. The Spirit convicts of these things. So my question to you is, have you experienced that work? Have you taken a position on your sin, the same position that God has, that you hate it? That you see it as wicked? You see it as vile? You see it as an offense against all that is good and true and beautiful and holy? Do you have that sense? Does it grieve your heart when you say or think or do things that are utterly opposed to all the glory and all the goodness of God? Do you see your sin? Well, praise God, friends. That is the ministry of the Holy Spirit. Aren't you happy that he carries out that ministry in your life? What if he didn't? He doesn't owe it to you, does he? One of the things that strikes me about Southern California, we lived here for four years, of course, and then up for two years in Chino, and now we live in West Michigan. And I was, we were out staying out in Encinitas these last couple of days. And the morning I go to the coffee shop and I see really good looking, healthy people. Everybody's jogging and running and they come in and I hear them talking about their plans for the weekend. They're going to go up to the mountains. They're going to go up north. They're going to go sailing. And I thought to myself, these people have no need for God. None that they sense. How would I introduce Jesus to these people who have no sense of need? Now, of course, that's true in Michigan as well. It's just that the weather and things sort of breed some despair that you can use to your advantage. There's no sense of need, you see. That would be you, friend, unless the Holy Spirit had done his beautiful convicting work. It's a wonderful reason for assurance if you're convicted of your sin. Truly convicted. And then John gives us the testimony of the apostles as another means by which we can gain assurance. The testimony of the apostles, verse 14. We have seen and testified that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. And when he says we have seen, he's not talking about we all. He's talking about we the apostles. We have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. John wants to remind his readers that he is an eyewitness to the Lord Jesus Christ. If you have your Bible still open, turn to the first chapter. Chapter 1, 1 John 1, verses 1 through 3. And just notice how John emphasizes over and over the reality that he was an eyewitness of what God has done in Jesus Christ. Verse 1, we'll pick it up, 1 John 1, verse 1. that which was from the beginning which we have heard which we have seen with our eyes which we looked upon and have touched with our hands concerning the word of life the life was made manifest and we have seen it and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life which was with the Father and was made manifest to us that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you. Over and over. We heard it. We saw it. We touched it. It was made manifest by God. God revealed it and we saw it and we touched it and we heard it and now we're telling you about it. That's a great reason for confidence. Peter in his second letter, chapter 1, verse 16, he says, we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of His majesty. When someone asks you, why do you believe this stuff? I mean, you actually believe that someone was virgin born? You actually believe that He did these crazy miracles? You actually believe that He was dead and then rose again from the dead? Hello? We live in the 21st century. Why do you believe this stuff? And you could say with absolute confidence, because John told me. And Peter told me, they saw it, they heard it, they touched it, and they are reliable witnesses. You see, why do people believe that Abraham Lincoln lived? Because somebody told them that he lived, and they believe the report. We have vastly superior historians, much superior eyewitnesses, inspired by the Holy Spirit. They tell us what they see. It's a wonderful ground and means of assurance. And then that leads right to the third means, our confession of Christ, verse 15. Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. Whoever confesses that Jesus, the man from Nazareth, is the Christ, that person, John says, can know that God abides in him. If you know that Jesus is the Son of God. And this is not just a token nodding to the bare facts. It is an embracing of the facts, the historical reality. It is a glad embracing all the truths that we confess together in the Apostles' Creed. I believe that this Jesus Christ is the only begotten Son of God. And I believe He was born of a virgin Mary. I believe that He suffered and was crucified under Pontius Pilate. I believe that he was dead and buried and suffered, experienced hell. And then I believe that he rose again from the dead. I absolutely believe it. And that he ascended to the right hand of God, the Father Almighty. And from there, he will come to judge the living and the dead. I believe that he is king right now. He'll be king tomorrow. He'll be king forever. His kingdom will have no end. And I believe on the basis of the word of God, I believe what Jesus said, that I'm coming back, that where I am, you will be also. Those are the facts of the gospel that we must believe. This is the good news that we profess. Now, if you believe those things, if you really, really believe those things, if push comes to shove, you say, yes, I'm convinced that they are true, and I delight in these things. The question to you is, how did that happen? How did you come to believe? And you say, well, I'm not sure. Maybe it was just because I was born and raised in the church. And I'll say, that's not possible. The church does not have the power to create faith, living true faith in the person of Jesus Christ. The church does not have that power. There are many people who are born and raised in the church and have walked away, don't believe a word of it. How did you come to this? Well, you came to it the same way Peter did. When Jesus asked Peter, who do men say that I am? And Peter gives this incredible profession. You are the Christ. You are the son of the living God. Jesus turns and says, blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah. Flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven. God revealed it to you. God gave you that faith. If you believe it, if you're convinced it's true, and you're delighted that it's true, all these glorious facts about the person of Jesus Christ, it's a great reason for confidence and assurance. God has given you a living faith. Flesh and blood did not give it to you. Your parents did not give it to you. Your Sunday school teacher and your teacher in the third grade, they did not give it to you. The Holy Spirit gave it to you. And so John says, verse 16, so as a result, so we have come to know and believe the love that God has for us. We've come to know and believe these things. I want you to again just see how John says this. He doesn't say, so we've come to know and believe these things are true. He means that, but he means more than that. He means we come to know and believe this fundamental fact of the Christian faith. We've come to know and believe the love God has for us. Brothers and sisters, Christian assurance is an assurance of God's love for us in Jesus Christ. I was talking to a man a few years ago, a good man, a member of our church, a man who was working hard to provide for his family and to raise his children. He was catechizing them. He was in the Word. and yet struggling with depression and anxiety. And so as we were talking, I said to him, why do you think it's so hard for you? Why do you think this fear, this anxiety hovers over you this way? You know what he said? If I could just know that God loved me, if I could just really know it, absolutely be convinced to the bottom of my heart and soul, if I could be absolutely confident that God loved me, I don't think he's alone. I think many of us live far below the confidence in God's love, the confidence that God intends us to have. Christian assurance, friends, is an assurance of this. Paul says it so well in Galatians 2.20, the life I live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. That's the fundamental fact. And so we have the content of this assurance. We have the means by which we gain this assurance, The work of the Holy Spirit, the testimony of the apostles, the confession of faith that God has worked in our own hearts. These are reasons to be sure. And then we have the fruit of this assurance, which is confidence in the day of judgment. Verse 17, John puts his finger on the great fear of men and women, doesn't he? The fear of death, the fear of judgment. You know what I'm talking about. Hebrews 2.15 says that Jesus came to free those who all their life were subject to fear. Let me say, it says this way, those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery. This is our secret fear, isn't it? We know we must die. Every one of us knows we must die. Mortality rate is 100%. And we know that after we die, we're going to stand before the judgment of God. We're going to stand before God. We're going to see God. We know we must do this, but isn't it true that we're often afraid to do this? We're not sure how to do this? And so you know what most American Christians do? We just don't think about it. There are not many best-selling Christian books, if you go to a Christian bookstore, on how to die. And yet it's the one thing we all will do. Spurgeon, a long time ago, said this. He says, that poet was half-inspired who said, men count all men mortal but themselves. Is that not so with us? We really do not expect to die. We reckon we shall live a very considerable time yet. Even those who are very aged still think that as a few others have lived to an extreme old age, so may they. Just about two weeks ago, I was at the optometrist's office getting some new glasses. I was talking there with a lady who was helping me. This is when all the discussion was taking place about the Mayan calendar and the end of the world. And I said to this lady, I said, wouldn't that be great if they're right? And she said, no, I am not ready for that yet. After a short pause, she said, I'm just not there yet. My kids are so much fun right now. This lady goes to a large church in the area. She professed to be a Christian and does not want to think about dying. She's not alone. She's not alone. I like what Spurgeon again says. He says, you say that you cannot abide the thought of death, then you greatly need it. You have something to learn if you are a Christian and yet are not prepared to die. That you are yet a babe in grace is clear from your admission that to depart and be with Christ does not seem to be a better thing for you than to abide in the flesh. You see, death and judgment are daunting thoughts. Let's not pretend otherwise. I've known good, godly people who in the face of death trembled. I had Aunt Eva. She was the oldest in her family, the oldest sister of my dad. She was a lady that took life by storm. You never would have thought that Aunt Eva had doubts about anything until she was on her deathbed. And my dad was with her, and she was scared. She said, Will, I was laying awake last night and thinking about all my sins. Will, there's a mountain, a mountain of sins, and I did them. They're all mine. My dad was able to minister to her the truth that we see right here. You see, friends, God desires that we have confidence for the day of judgment. God's desire is that you have no fear. No fear whatsoever. Well, how do we get that? Let's wrap up with this. The foundation of this assurance. John here says in verse 16, God is love. Whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him, and by this is love perfected with us. There's two things here that I'm going to point out, and then we'll wrap up. There's two foundations for this assurance. One is what John calls perfected love, and the other is what John calls perfect love. When John is speaking of perfected love, verse 17 and we see it also in verse 12 he's talking about the reality of sanctification that God's love is poured out upon us and God's love has a goal it's working towards something within us something that is is being perfected is something that's moving towards an end and the end of course is is God is leading us in sanctification he's he's leading us into into love love is is the law isn't it love for the god god to our father and love for each other and that's john says here that work of sanctification as god pours his love into our lives and and that love is being perfected and and bearing fruit in our lives john says that's a great source of encouragement verse 17 what's going to be the confidence in verse 17 he says the confidence is as he is so also are we in this world that what paul says in romans chapter 8 is true that god has predestined us to be to conform to the image the likeness of a son that we are a new creation and we're called to put on our new self which is being created in the likeness of Jesus God is at work sanctifying you and John says that's a great encouragement to you you're becoming more like Jesus you're beginning to more and more value the things that Jesus values isn't that true in your life the things that once excited you about what's going on in the world maybe it's in the in the arena of sports or politics or shopping, romance, I mean, whatever it might have been, the thing that was your passion, the thing that you love to think about, you love to talk about, and as you move along in life, you realize all these things are passing away. It was sort of a surprise to me a while back when I was just thinking about sports and football and University of Michigan football in particular, and I realized it's a game. Did you know that? It's a game. G-A-M-E. It's a game. It has no more significance than you playing Scrabble in your living room. And yet people live and die by it. But see, when you come to Christ, you begin to realize that it just doesn't matter. What I'm getting excited about, you see, as a Christian, you begin to say, what I'm getting excited about is my Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. That excites me. Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Is that happening to you? Isn't that true of you? You're beginning to be like Jesus. That's a source of great encouragement. And yet, that's a slow process. It's taken me a long time to realize that football is just a game. And there are days when that process doesn't seem to be taking place at all. And the devil is very quick to remind you of the failures in your life, the sin that's in your heart. He's the accuser of the brethren. John knows this. And so he doesn't root our assurance primarily in, or merely, I should say, in perfected love. He doesn't root and ground the foundation of your assurance in what God is doing in you. He roots it in what God has done for you. That's what he means by perfect love. Verse 18, there is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. What does he mean by perfect love? It can't be ours. We've never loved God or our brother ever a day in our life perfectly. Not even close. So what does he mean? Well, he's clearly speaking about the love that God has for us. He's reminding us of what he said in verses 9 and 10. In this, the love of God was made manifest. It was revealed that God sent his only son into the world so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins. That's perfect love. And friends, that's the love that removes fear. It removes all fear. How does it do that? By addressing the reasons for fear. What do we fear when we think about dying? Maybe we think about the pain. Maybe it's scary because we've never done it before. But isn't it true that part of the fear is, am I really ready? Well, what about my sin? You see, will my sin go with me to the throne of God? And we hear the accusing voice of the serpent. We hear the indicting whispers of our own conscience. We hear the thundering condemnation of the law. Our fear is not foolish in that sense. You have sinned against God. He is holy. And you will face Him. And the Bible says, who will stand on that great day of wrath? Oh, but John wants you to know that God in his perfect love has given you a perfect solution to your fear. Your fear of punishment is answered with the fact of propitiation, verse 10. God loved you and he sent his son to be the propitiation for your sin. I was listening a while back to a sermon by Sinclair Ferguson, and he says, I often tell pastors, it is a great sin to say the gospel is that Jesus died for my sins and so God loves me. It's a great sin to say that Jesus died for my sins so that God could love me. He says that's not the gospel. You've turned the gospel completely on its head. The gospel is the Father loved you. Therefore, he sent his Son to be the propitiation of our sin. That's exactly what John says. And this is love, not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and he sent his Son. Out of His love, He sent His Son. Out of His love, He sent His only Son, His precious Son, to be the propitiation for our sin, to be the thing that turns away the wrath. And Jesus, of course, does this. He turns away the wrath by bearing the sin, by bearing the guilt. He didn't just die for your sins, friend. He died for your propitiation. He died to not just remove the guilt, but to remove the condemnation, to change your status fundamentally before God in heaven so that you're no longer under the law. There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ. Jesus died so that God could justly, this is such a glorious truth, God could justly justify you, the unrighteous. Jesus died so that as the wrath of God was poured out on him, all the love of God was poured out on you. I think too often we profess our faith in Christ's death without boldly claiming what it accomplished. It's not enough to say, in my place condemned he stood. You must say, sealed my pardon with his blood. You must say it. That's the gospel. Sealed my pardon with his blood. And then you'll sing, hallelujah. What a savior. Then you're going to know freedom from fear because Jesus has taken away the reasons for fear. Let me wrap up with this. Luther says this, What more should God do to persuade you to accept death willingly and not to dread it? What more could he do? That's the question Luther asks. In Christ, he offers you the image of life, of grace, and of salvation, so that you may not be horrified by the images of sin and death and hell. He has laid your sin, your death, and your hell on his dearest son, vanquished them, and rendered them harmless for you. He commands all his angels, all saints, all creatures to join him in watching over you, to be concerned about your soul and to receive it and to relieve you of all doubts. He grants you a sure sign, namely the holy sacraments. What more can or should he do? Is there anything that God would yet need to do? Can you think of anything? You might say, well, it'd be nice if an angel would come and testify to me. Friends, you have something vastly greater than an angel. You have Jesus Christ, the Son of God himself, who testifies in his very word by the Holy Spirit. John Stamm, the young man who was martyred, his dad was a pastor in New Jersey. And he had received a letter from John. It had been written several weeks before and it slowly made its way across the ocean. But he received that letter the very same day he heard via telegram of John's death. And in that letter, this young missionary wrote about the threat of the communists. But he reminded his father that he was not afraid to die. And he quoted a poem there by another China missionary, J.W. Vinson, who himself had been captured by bandits some years before. The bandits had asked Vinson if he was afraid to die. Vinson said, no, not if you can shoot straight. Because if you shoot straight, I will go straight to heaven. And they did shoot straight, and he did. Vinson had penned this poem, which Stam now quoted to his father. Afraid of what? To feel the Spirit's glad release? to pass from pain to perfect peace, the strife and strain of life to cease, afraid of that? Afraid of what? Afraid to see the Savior's face, to hear his welcome, and to trace the glory gleam from wounds of grace? Afraid of that? Friends, the good news is that you have no reason to fear if you are in Jesus Christ. You have no reason to fear anything. not death, not judgment, not loss, not the loss of your possessions, not the loss of your children, your grandchildren. The most precious things in this world you do not need to fear. God has loved you in Jesus Christ and he's given you means to know and to believe the love that God has for you. May God grant it. Amen. Oh, Father in heaven, you know our hearts. You know our fears. You know our unbelief. You know our struggles. You know the tears that we cry alone at night as we think about our sin and our failures. Oh, Father, thank you that you care. Thank you that you minister to your people. Father, you know tonight if there are some here who have every reason to fear because they do not know Jesus. They have a form of religion but do not know the power of it. Father, I pray that the Spirit would do that precious work of convicting their hearts that they would see their sin and the awful beauty of your righteousness and the unavoidable approaching of judgment and that tonight, Lord, that soul would flee to Jesus. Oh, Father, may we all do the same, that we would seek our shelter in that precious rock and we would abide under that great mountain of grace and truth that we find in our Lord Jesus Christ. Father, bless us, give us the faith that we desperately need, give us the faith that assures us, that comforts us, that gives us confidence. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.